Thomas Deretich and Name-Worshipping

[Suaidan]

Wonderful, Bruder Klaus !
Glad to hear about that ! I thought the painting was so distinctive that i just had to ask.
Appreciate the answer.

I think I'll read more about Emperor Otto, as your explanation piqued my interest.

Fr Joseph, or anyone : is/was Fr George Lardas a Greek, then ? I always heard the name but never thought of it. Is he still alive ? In which jurisdiction is he today, if so ?

Greek- ROCOR-MP

[Barbara]

Oh thank you.

[Thomas_Deretich]

NEITHER NAME-WORSHIPPING, NOR ANTI-PALAMISM,
BUT ONLY THE TRADITIONAL ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN CONSENSUS
by Thomas S. Deretich

Since Euphrosynos Cafe has published public accusations of “heresy,” it only seems fair that Euphrosynos Cafe would also permit a theological response showing that what HOCNA has written in the past on God’s name is wholly traditional without any new doctrines. People are free to hurl accusations of “heresy” in the future; however, it is only fair that they not make any more such accusations until they have read this concise posting and the attached (49-page) compilation, “Neither Created-Name-Adoration nor Name-Fighting: Orthodox Christian Dogmatic Theology on Divinity, Energy, and Name.” I alone am responsible for any errors in this posting and the attachment.

I am not a spokesman (official or unofficial) for the Holy Orthodox Church in North America (HOCNA) or the Holy Orthodox Metropolis of Boston (H.O.M.B.). However, I am certainly able to quote from several of HOCNA’s official statements over the years related to the names of God. These statements and many others make it crystal clear that HOCNA does not teach any “heresy” related to the names of God. HOCNA has always followed the final doctrinal decision of the Orthodox Church on this matter (in Saint Tikhon of Moscow’s February 1921 letter): “not to consider His Name to be God’s essence, not to separate it from God, not to consider it another Deity, not to deify [or give divine-worship to] letters and sounds and random thoughts about God” (Имя Его не считать за сущность Божию, не отделять от Бога, не почитать за особое Божество, не обожать букв и звуков и случайных мыслей о Боге).

Those who reject that Tikhonian settlement (which HOCNA accepts) make a fundamental error. They confuse Orthodox “name-glorification” with heretical “name-worship” (giving divine worship to created names). To confuse these two different things would be a violation of dogma because the Seventh Ecumenical Council teaches that we must always make a clear distinction between the “latreía” (divine adoration, absolute worship) given to God alone and the “proskýnēsis” (veneration, or worship in the broad sense of “honor”) given to saints, icons, relics, and the Scriptures. It is a violation of Orthodox dogma to confuse Orthodox “imiaslavie” (name-glorification) with heretical “imiabozhie” (name-deification with respect to created names). It is a violation of Orthodox dogma to confuse Orthodox “onomatodoxía” (name-glorification) with heretical “onomatolatreía” (giving divine worship to created names). No one should ever use “name-glorification” interchangeably with “name-worship,” since this violates the teachings of the Seventh Ecumenical Council.

**

The Holy Orthodox Church in North America (HOCNA) and its Holy Orthodox Metropolis of Boston (H.O.M.B.), as well as Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Boston/Brookline, have been falsely accused of the heresy of name-worshipping. HOCNA has been more detailed, more precise, more balanced, more synodal, more scriptural, and more patristic than any other synod in condemning the heresy of name-worshipping, with a long series of very detailed theological statements. Three months before the debate came to a head in September 2012, Metropolitan Ephraim, wrote, in an internationally distributed statement, on June 6/19, 2012, that: “if anybody (including Father Anthony Bulatovich) is guilty of … Deifying letters, sounds and random/accidental thoughts about God, … then he is certainly guilty of heresy. If he does not actually advocate such teachings [the four errors listed by Saint Tikhon], then it only seems fair to say that he is not guilty of heresy.” Please note that claiming that “a created name consisting of letters and sounds is an uncreated energy of God” would be a form of deifying letters and sounds. Therefore, Metropolitan Ephraim has always clearly rejected the false notion that a created name can be an uncreated energy. On November 7/20, 2017, Metropolitan Gregory of Boston, stated in an internationally published interview, “Not only letters and sounds, but also human ideas and thoughts, that is, everything which created words consist of, are not God. To deify them is to fall into pantheism. We have always condemned this false teaching and will continue to condemn it, both in writing and verbally. This is what ‘Name-worshiping’ is. Of course this is a heresy, and we have never had anything to do with this teaching.… As regards the historical Athonite controversy concerning the Name of God, we as the local Church in North America (and not at all the local Russian Church), have no intention of meddling in this or resolving it, adhering in this to the position of the Most Holy Tikhon, Patriarch of Moscow,..., which at this time canonically represents the last word expressed by the Russian Church on this question, until its careful and unbiased future examination by a legitimate Council. All our current theological views proceed from theses set forth in this document [by Saint Tikhon in 1921].… The prerogative of finally resolving the ‘Athonite affair,’ in our opinion, belongs to a future legitimate Council of the Russian Church, the successor of the All-Russian Council of 1917–18, which was to have taken up this matter, but was not able to because of the civil war and troubles which began in Russia. But to confess and adhere to the teaching of the Holy Fathers on this or on any other theological question — that is not only our business, but simply our duty! I will personally add, that if anyone intentionally or even due to ignorance and lack of education, during the events of the beginning of the last century on Athos, fell into the error of ‘Name-worshiping,’ that is, pantheism, then of course we condemn this.” From 2019 to this day, HOCNA’s official website (homb.org) states, “The Holy Orthodox Church in North America (HOCNA) has always considered ‘name-worshipping’ (giving divine-worship to a created name or claiming that a created name is God or divine energy) to be heresy. HOCNA has always taught that it would be heresy to deify created letters and sounds, to claim that a created name can be God or divine energy.”

One real difference is that HOCNA focusses especially on quoting and following the exact words of Saint Gregory Palamas, the Palamite synods, the Synodicon of Orthodoxy, the Tsar-Martyr’s April 1914 statement, the 1914 Moscow Synodal Office resolution, and the definitive resolution under Saint Tikhon (1920 to 1925), encapsulated in his February 1921 statement—whereas critics of HOCNA claim to follow “the synodal decision” of May 16/29, 1913. These critics seem unaware that among the seven-bishop, two-layman meeting that day there were actually four massively-contradictory written opinions that could not agree on elementary doctrine, such as what God, deity, attributes, energies, names, and indwelling are. The one opinion (of the four) that HOCNA-critics focus on most was actually written by Sergius Stragorodskii and was the most un-Orthodox of the four. Sergius claimed that God’s attributes and energies are “not God, especially not ‘God Himself,’” but “merely Deity” in a “sense that is broader than usual.” Saint Gregory Palamas, the Palamite synods, and the Synodicon of Orthodoxy had already condemned and anathematized that view of “Deity” as cutting the one Deity into two disparate deities, as heresy, ditheism, polytheism, and godlessness. So, obviously, HOCNA cannot endorse Sergius’s anti-Palamite written opinion of May 16/29, 1913. Even the seven bishops that day did not agree with the theological errors in that written opinion. The so-called “synodal” statements issued by Constantinople from 1912 to 1914 on name-glorification have virtually no theological content whatsoever. They can be summarized in two words, repeated over and over: persecute more, persecute more. The Constantinopolitan statements had no theological content to endorse and the persecution that they endorsed should not be endorsed by any conscientious Christian today.

Another real difference is that HOCNA is unequivocal that Saint John of Kronstadt’s teachings on the name of God have perfectly Orthodox interpretations and should not be subjected to condemnation or skepticism. Saint John of Kronstadt’s teachings should be openly quoted and defended based on Scripture, liturgy, ancient fathers, Byzantine fathers, Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk, and Saint Tikhon of Moscow’s final Orthodox decision.

OTHER HOCNA STATEMENTS

HOCNA Synod of Bishops, August 29/September 11, 2012: “Our Holy Synod endorses and espouses the theological solution to the controversy surrounding the Name of God found in the following Encyclical of Saint Tikhon, Patriarch of Moscow “… not to deify letters, sounds and random/accidental thoughts about God.”

HOCNA Synod of Bishops, September 5/18, 2012: “We do not believe … That letters, sounds and random/accidental thoughts about God are to be deified.” HOCNA Synod of Bishops, September 27/October 10, 2012: “Orthodox Christians believe: … That created letters, sounds, and random or accidental thoughts about God must not be deified. Further, they believe that these letters or sounds must not be used for occult or magical purposes.”

Bishop Gregory of Brookline, October 7/20, 2012: “When this Name is articulated in human words, it, of course, is not the Energy of God, but rather, it has the same holiness as an icon, and we may say that God’s Energy is present in this created (sacred) word.”

Excerpts from Serge Verhovskoy, distributed by Metropolitan Ephraim, November 28, 2012: “A Name of God, as a human word, is, of course, created. (It is, therefore, possible to use it senselessly or ‘in vain.’ The identification of a Name of God, as a [created] word, with God Himself is a heresy which was condemned by the Russian Holy Synod in the twentieth century.) But God Himself can dwell and act in it.”

Metropolitan Ephraim of Boston, Bishop Gregory of Brookline, and Thomas Deretich, March 16, 2014: “in terms of human speech, the names of God are both created and temporal, being part of this world, and they are certainly not an Energy of God.”

[Thomas_Deretich]

Thomas is a heretic.... And Thomas does not merely mention Puhalo and Romanides--he uses these flaming heretics as authorities in matters of theology.

Another unfair misrepresentation of what I have written. Please see attached PDF of a 2014 article I wrote arguing that Romanides is not an Orthodox authority. It was posted on at least two traditionalist email lists. To be fair to Romanides, I would like to add that he had great knowledge of intellectual history (Orthodox, Islamic, Western), and not everything that he wrote is guilty of "extreme apophaticism." Romanides's extremely apophatic paragraphs (criticized in my article) were definitely misused in a nominalist direction by some in 2012. Metropolitan Hierotheos Vlachos (not an authority, but possible the most prolific and influential living Greek religious writer) did not read Romanides in a nominalist direction. But others took Romanides's writings in a nominalist, ecumenist, extreme-apophatic, relativistic, or postmodernist direction. The article criticizes that tendency. Metropolitan Ephraim of Boston emailed my article to all his clergy. So that is more evidence that Metropolitan Ephraim is treated unfairly, by Vladimir Moss and others, when Metropolitan Ephraim has been falsely accused of following Romanides. Romanides, Florovsky, and Vlachos have written some good things. And it is appropriate to quote them when relevant. Same with Augustine: made errors, but worth quoting at select times.

[Suaidan]

NEITHER NAME-WORSHIPPING, NOR ANTI-PALAMISM,
BUT ONLY THE TRADITIONAL ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN CONSENSUS
by Thomas S. Deretich

Since Euphrosynos Cafe has published public accusations of “heresy,” it only seems fair that Euphrosynos Cafe would also permit a theological response showing that what HOCNA has written in the past on God’s name is wholly traditional without any new doctrines.

"Euphrosynos Cafe" doesn't "publish" anything. It's a forum. That's like saying this ridiculous essay was "published" by the forum when it was "published" by you.

[StIgnatius]

This question comes from ignorance and trying learn. Sometimes google can lead you to inaccurate or unhelpful information. Is the name worshipping heresy accurately and clearly defined anywhere? It may be that I have week googling skills. I want to make sure I understand what this heresey is and steer clear of it or any variant trying to sneak in the same concept disguised as something else or by another name. Lord have mercy on me and protect me from falling into heresey.

[Suaidan]

recommended https://onimyaslavie.blogspot.com/